Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Wyatt, the potty trainer!

I know no one really cares about our potty training journey (unless of course, you are about to start one of your own!), but I still wanted to write about it. When I wanted to pull out my hair and pull back out the diapers, it was very helpful to me to go back and read about when I trained Audrey. You think you'll never forget something so traumatic as bodily functions happening all over your house, but details always grow fuzzy over time!

Wyatt had started telling me when he needed to do #2 probably at least a month ago, and pretty consistently. I knew he was still so young (now 19.5 mos), but I'm of the opinion that there's a magic window of time for many kids when they first gain physiological control that they are able to learn to use the potty. So I watched and debated. I got him a potty seat a couple weeks ago, and started letting him sit on it occasionally, mostly right b/f bath. He also is a predictable pooper, so I stuck him on there after breakfast several mornings. Last week, he pooped 3 times and peed a couple while sitting! Then it so happened that my work schedule changed this week (normally Tu/Th, not readily giving me a nice 3 day window of time), to where I would be home Mon, Tu, Wed. The stars are aligned!

I felt much more chill about training this time around, giving myself an open door. If it just went really terrible, we could try again in a couple months. It's not like the baby is coming next month! We have time. So Monday morning, we jumped right in. We had our giant stack of Spiderman and Cars underwear in the bathroom, our Clorox wipes, our Skittles, a tall pile of cleaning rags w/ antibacterial Windex and Resolve. We had the big pep talk of "No more diapers! Don't teetee in your underwear, tell Momma when you need to go! You're a big boy now, you use the potty!" He shook his head and almost giggled when I said don't pee on Spiderman, like that was the most absurd thought in the world! Pee on Spiderman?!?! Never!

Monday was, well a mess. I think he was ~50% in the morning, but I couldn't get him to drink a ton, so we didn't really have lots of opportunities. After nap, he started downing the juice, so we had LOTS of opportunities, most of which were not successes. I think he actually peed 3 times in a row, in his highchair while trying to eat supper. Ugh. After 5ish pees on the floor/chair, while I'm still stalking him saying "Tell Momma when you need to teetee!" ad nauseum (Yes, I even annoyed myself...), he did announce "poopoo!" and head toward the bathroom. Sat on the potty, and peed. Ok, we're starting to get somewhere! He went 2 more times b/f bed, so I felt ok about the whole process.

That night, I had a bunch of dreams where he was totally on the ball on Day 2. Just clicked overnight, and moved right along. Well, those dreams set me up for disappointment! Day 2 did NOT start well! Again, lots of juice. And lots of opportunities. Most of them were partial successes. He'd start to pee, I'd holler "You're going teetee!" and we'd run to the bathroom. Still LOTS of cleaning and lots of underwear, but he at least was stopping, holding, running, sitting THEN peeing. It was a busy morning, and I was starting to feel discouraged by naptime. Wouldn't you if you had to clean pee from your carpeted closet floor, the couch, the play tunnel, Audrey's play kitchen, the living room carpet, the kitchen floor, and inside the dryer?? When I woke him up from nap, 3.5 hrs later, his underwear were dry!!!!??? Wha?? After a morning like this one, how in the world did he hold his bladder for 3.5 hours?? But he did! And apparently that's when he flipped a switch. He only had 1 more accident the rest of the day (while I was busy answering the door) and 1 slightly damp underwear, everything else in the potty! Woohoo! Now we're cooking!

I got a little greedy, I guess. Since his brain switched on over naptime, I thought, well, we may as well try bedtime too! So underwear to bed, woke him up at 9:30 to pee, and crossed my fingers. Alas, he woke up soaked this am. Worth a shot though! Day 3 is upon us. After breakfast, he told me "poopoo!" and then ran and peed on the potty! He announces both of them as poopoo at this point. But I don't care! I'm not changing any more diapers! We'll tease out a few more details later. :) Over the course of the morning, he told me every.single.time. that he needed to go! 2 poops and lots of pee in the potty! I think he's got it! The only accidents we had were 1 teeny tiny damp underwear, and then when he reallllly didn't want to stop what he was doing, he didn't fully empty his bladder, so we had 3 trips in a row w/ dampness in between. But I still count victories! He didn't empty his bladder on the floor, and it's not a big deal to me to need fresh undies.

Kudos once again to my sweet big boy. These 3 days have worn him (and Momma!!) out! But we're done w/ diapers and his tiny hiney looks so cute in Spidey underwear. Call me crazy, and I probably wouldn't disagree w/ you. But I now have ~4.5 months of DIAPER FREE DAYS!! That alone is worth a little happy dance!

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